


Mistaken

by Willa Shakespeare (AnonEhouse)



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Betrayal, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Post Star One
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-13
Updated: 2013-05-13
Packaged: 2017-12-11 18:35:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/801875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonEhouse/pseuds/Willa%20Shakespeare
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blake and Jenna are separated from the Liberator in the aftermath of the battle at Star One. Jenna finds him on Jevron, trying to pick up the pieces of the rebellion.</p><p>Blake refuses to deepen their relationship- the rebellion is more important.  Blake makes mistakes where Jenna is concerned.</p><p> </p><p>  <b>NOTE: The story originally ended with the one chapter, and you may find it more satisfying to stop there. The next chapter has been referred to as a literary cheat. Indeed one indignant reader informed me that 'YOU CAN'T DO THAT'.</b><br/> <br/><b>Au contraire my friend. I can.</b></p><p>  <b>But if you feel literary conventions must be adhered to, then do not read the second chapter.</b></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

(If you are reading this on any PAY site this is a STOLEN WORK, the author has NOT Given Permission for it to be here. If you're paying to read it, you're being cheated too because you can read it on Archiveofourown for FREE.)

Blake sighed. Another dirty alley, another sordid exchange with the crime lords who ruled this slum. And all to obtain the barest necessities for his latest rebel group in return for whatever disgusting, immoral task they couldn't find a mercenary willing to perform. Sometimes he wondered if he was accomplishing anything at all. Oh, yes, he'd found sympathetic ears on Jevron, people who despised the Federation, and what it had made of their world. But that was as far as he'd gotten. Rousing the people to fight was much harder than he had imagined. Particularly as the Federation seldom obliged with any blatant atrocities against the disheartened populace.

The Federation hold on Jevron was mostly economic. It seemed a more effective policy than outright militarism. For example, the space port and all the ships that docked there belonged to the Federation. Even the freighters that brought in the small, but steady, supply of off-world essentials and luxuries belonged to the Federation Civil Administration. Squat ugly ships, they resembled the London too much for Blake's peace of mind, recalling the months he'd spent aboard that cramped tin can. He sighed again, thinking of the companions he'd met on that ship, and since lost. What he wouldn't give for Avon's brilliant mind, Gan's calm strength, even Vila's unique skills. And Jenna... ah, Jenna was something else again. Not a fervent rebel like Cally, but devoted to him, if not his cause.

He shook himself. They were gone, as lost to him as if they were all as dead as poor Gan. He hoped they had all made it back to the ship. He trusted Avon to do his best to keep them safe, but beyond that... well, who could tell what Avon would do. He hadn't heard any rumours of the Federation suddenly unveiling new and startling space ship technology, so at least Avon hadn't sold out. Not that he ever really thought Avon would, but, well... 

A shadowy figure appeared at the end of the alley, and Blake dragged himself back into the dreary present. Jevron's rebel movement might not be much in the galactic scheme of things, but they depended on him. "Liberator," came the identification signal. It was a woman's voice, although with an odd huskiness.

A woman. That was unusual. On this backwater world, the sexes seemed to have more clearly defined roles than on Earth, with the women mostly restricted to subordinate positions, regardless of ability. Rather a waste, but Blake hadn't the energy to fight two causes at once. 

"Zen," he gave the reply, belatedly, wondering why the voice sounded familiar.

The woman moved closer, and slipped back the heavy gray cowl of her cape. 

"What?" Blake started forward, but the woman held up her hand.

"Business first," she said in that husky voice that still held traces of the tones he'd come to know so well. "Breddan wants his junk." She jerked her chin back over her shoulder, indicating another figure standing further back. "He let me come to make the exchange, but not alone."

"Jenna." Blake stared. She had changed, subtly. She was still beautiful, but indefinably dulled.

"Blake," she answered him flatly. She held up a packet. "Address and keys to the warehouse where the 'equipment' is stored." She tossed the packet to his feet. "We can go there, if you want to check it out."

"I trust you," Blake said. He pulled a bulkier package out of his pocket and tossed it to her.

"Oh?" Jenna caught the package deftly, tore open a corner of the 'brick', and dipped a finger into the brown, crumbly paste revealed. She sniffed, then barely touched the tip of her tongue to the paste on her finger. She grimaced and shuddered. "Prime. Breddan will be pleased." She turned and handed the package to the hooded figure that had come up beside her, silent as a ghost. "I'm staying to talk over old times with Blake," she told him, her or it. "Take that to the boss."

The figure nodded and left as silently as it had come.

"Jenna?" Blake held out his arms, hesitantly. Jenna's hard veneer seemed to crack and she flew into the shelter of his arms.

"Roj. Oh, Roj." She didn't weep, but her entire body trembled. Abruptly, she lifted her head and stared into Blake's eyes. "Love me, Roj."

"What, here?" Blake answered, trying to make it a joke.

"Don't," Jenna said, harshly. "On Liberator, you wouldn't commit yourself to me, because you were afraid it would disrupt the crew. We're not on Liberator now."

"But I'm still fighting, Jenna," Blake replied, running a caressing hand over her hair. "The situation on Jevron..."

"What about it? So you're still leading a rebellion. Does that mean we can't have any life for ourselves? Are all your followers celibate, Roj? Or were you never interested in me, and only stringing me along because you needed a pilot?"

"Jenna." Blake hugged her tighter. "It isn't that. It was never like that. I don't dare get involved with you because I care too much. It would be so easy to love you. Too easy."

"Then do it." Jenna's eyes were huge and imploring. "I destroyed my bracelet, Roj. I could have rejoined the ship, but I heard that you were on Jevron and I came for you instead. It wasn't easy." She swallowed, and continued, touching her hand to a fading scar on her throat. "But I knew you wouldn't come back after what you said to Avon. I gave up the Liberator for you. If you know me at all, you know what that meant to me."

"Liberator is a wonderful ship."

"Liberator is freedom. And power, and respect, and safety, and it could have been home." Blake had never heard Jenna so passionate. "On this world, they won't even let me fly an inter-city shuttle. And I'm stuck here. I bribed a freighter captain with the last of the gems I took from Liberator in order to get here."

"I'm sorry. Sorry you had to suffer to get here, but I'm not sorry you are here. I need a friend, Jenna, someone I can trust."

"And that's all?" 

"For now, that's all I can honestly offer."

"Sometimes a little dishonesty isn't such a bad thing."

"Now that you're here, I'll make finding a ship a priority."

"For us?"

Blake hated to crush the hope in Jenna's ruined voice, but it wasn't fair to her, or to the others who depended on his leadership. "For us to contact Avalon, and the other rebel groups in this sector. I was wrong to think that lightning raids from space would bring the Federation to its knees. What we must have is a concerted effort by all the Outer Worlds."

"Jevron? This flea-bitten dustball is going to attack the Federation?"

"No," Blake admitted. "But I'm learning how to create unrest and start a grass roots movement on a planet the Federation considers completely docile and harmless. That knowledge can be passed on to other worlds, other rebel leaders."

"So you're using Jevron, just like you used Liberator." Jenna pulled away from Blake. "I see. Well, that answers all my questions." She brushed a hand over her hair, and straightened her cape. 

"Jenna?" Blake didn't care for the coldness in Jenna's lovely eyes, even though he'd deliberately alienated her. But it was better to alienate her now than to love her, and grow to hate her for the constraints their love would put on him and his fight. The lives and freedom of uncounted billions had to rate more highly than the happiness of two individuals.

Jenna turned back to him, briskly. "Oh, don't worry. I understand perfectly. You can contact me through the usual channels. Breddan doesn't exactly trust me, but he's come to respect my skills, and he finds me useful, too. I'm sure it will be advantageous for both of you if I stay where I am and act as go-between."

"I didn't mean to hurt you, Jenna."

"No, of course not. It's just that you can't love one woman. Not with the responsibility for all humanity on your shoulders." She held her head high. "But Blake, one thing..."

"Yes?"

"When you get your ship I'll pilot it for you. Anywhere you like, and take a message to anyone you care to name. But after that, don't expect me to come back."

"I understand."

"I doubt it. I really do doubt it, Blake." Jenna flipped the cowl back over her head and strode off into the shadows without a glance back.

***

"Blake."

Blake didn't look up from the plans he was studying. "Jenna," he replied, "have you got the reports from..." He was interrupted by a data disk sailing through the air in front of his face. He snatched it before it could crash into the wall beside his desk. "Jenna," he growled, "do you know what that disk cost?"

"Enough to buy me a ship, I'll wager."

Blake looked up, drawn by the bitterness in her voice. He hadn't really seen Jenna in a while. Oh, she'd been there, coolly and efficiently providing assistance and support. It was exactly what he'd asked of her, so he couldn't complain, but he missed the camaraderie they'd shared aboard Liberator. Now he noticed how drawn and weary she'd become.

"I know you're discouraged, but be patient. it won't be long now."

"Patient?" Jenna's eyes narrowed. "Do you have any idea how long I've been trapped on this miserable world, running errands for you and Breddan? Six months, Blake. If I don't get back into space soon, I'll have lost my edge. A pilot's nothing without that."

"It couldn't be helped. I'm sorry, but..."

"That's all I ever hear from you." Jenna leaned over his desk, hands splayed to support her as she brushed aside papers and disks to stare into his face. "It isn't good enough, Blake. I think you haven't even looked for a ship. I think you never intend to find me a ship."

"That's not true. Just as soon as the situation stabilizes, getting a ship is the highest priority."

"This year, next year, sometime, never." Jenna pushed back from the desk, and gazed down at Blake, her eyes gone as blank and inscrutable as Avon's ever were. "You're afraid to let me go, aren't you? Afraid that without me you're nothing but Roj Blake, rebel leader- not a real man at all. I pity you, but I'm not going to be your prop anymore. I'll get my own ship, my own way." She turned, and glanced back over her shoulder. "You're rotting here. If you had any sense you'd get off Jevron, too, before it's too late. You could die here and be forgotten just as easily as the next man. And there won't even be anyone to cry over you." With that she left.

"You don't understand, Jenna," Blake said aloud to the empty room. "But you will. When the Federation falls, then you'll see that all our sacrifices were worth it."

***

A week later, Blake was once more sitting at his desk. This time he was ignoring the pieces of the revolutionary jigsaw he'd been trying to assemble, thinking about Jenna instead. She hadn't come back. She'd been seen several times at the spaceport, apparently trying to bargain with the crews for passage. He hated to think what she must be offering, but apparently it wasn't enough to make breaking Federation regulations worthwhile. If she was that desperate, he had to find a way to let her go - more than that - to get her a ship of her own. It was the least he owed her. 

And it should be possible. Although the Federation nominally owned the Civil Administration freighters, in actual practice many of them were operated by independent captains who paid licensing and leasing fees in return for a share of the profits. He'd found captains willing to sign over their contracts for a quick profit. The problem was that the money would have to come from the revolution's coffers. Another thing he'd lost when he left Liberator was the treasure room.

While the Jevron cadre had welcomed him with open arms they'd kept the purse-strings closed. He would have to convince the purchasing committee that buying Jenna a ship would somehow repay them. Getting information to Avalon didn't impress them. Not unless there was something they could count on Avalon doing for them in return. 

"Blake."

"Yes?" Blake temporarily gave up on Jenna's problem. "What is it?"

"Message from your lady."

Blake frowned. He'd never been able to convince the locals not to refer to Jenna that way. It made her even more bitter to hear them acknowledge what he couldn't. "Give it to me," he said, brusquely, dismissing the messenger. The message was a folded sheet of pale lavender paper, scented with Jenna's perfume and sealed with a blot of magenta wax imprinted with the shape of her signet ring. Like a love note. Jenna always sent her private messages in this archaic fashion. She said that Avon had once told her nothing ever input on a computer was ever entirely gone. Paper could be burnt.

He felt slightly queasy, wondering just how bad the news was. He steeled himself, and chipped off the wax, unfolding the note. 

_Blake, he read, I've found a ship, but I need your help. The captain needs a good pilot for some shady deals. He'd be glad to have the Liberator's pilot, but he doesn't believe it was me. He's seen you on the vid-casts, so if you'll come and vouch for me, he'll take me on._

_We'll be waiting for you at the blue warehouse on Magno and Second. Come alone, or he'll run._

_Jenna_

Not exactly a love note. Blake rose wearily, feeling suddenly very old and alone. He should get back-up, have someone at least follow him to the meeting place. Rule one of the rebel's survival manual : trust no one. He shook his head. No. Not Jenna. Besides, he didn't want any witnesses, any smug knowing looks as he said farewell to the woman who should have been his.

***

The meeting place was a seedy warehouse with broken windows and drab little arthropods scuttling through the dust leaving hieroglyphic signs as they went. It smelled, as all Jevron's warehouses seemed to, of mold, and banned drugs, and volatile chemicals that should have been stored in a controlled environment. Everything was slipshod here. No one really cared about anything. He was finding it hard to care himself. Maybe Jenna was right, and Jevron was sucking the life out of him. Maybe he should ask this captain if he had a place on his crew for a slightly rusty engineer. 

The loading dock was open, the corroded panel that should have sealed it shoved up half way. It was stuck there, he discovered by putting a hand to the panel. He peered inside. Light filtered reluctantly through the broken windows high up in the featureless walls. Standing in one rectangle of dim, gray light were two figures. "Jenna?" he called, and stepped inside.

He stood for a moment, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. Then he sensed someone near him and turned, but not fast enough, as something very heavy came down on him. The darkness was shot through with flashes of red lightning, bright as the pain that lanced through his skull. Vaguely he felt the floor rise up and strike his knees, then the darkness and silence were complete.

***

"No," Blake said again. He'd said it so many times that it came out automatically - although not too clearly as his mouth was swollen, bruised and full of blood. The Federation guards weren't too imaginative. Or maybe duty on Jevron made them slipshod too. They hadn't used any machines or drugs on him: only the simplest of tools: fists, feet, a little knife work to break up the monotony. 

"Come now, admit it. You're Blake. We all know that. You're famous. You wouldn't be here on Jevron if you didn't have big plans, bigger than any little local uprising. Where's the Liberator? When's your ship coming to get you?" 

"Never," Blake said. He glared at the interrogator as best he could. He could see nothing through the blood masking the left half of his face and his eye burned on that side. He didn't think they'd actually cut the eye itself, but he'd had no chance to check. He'd been strapped in this chair ever since he regained consciousness, long enough for thirst and hunger to be part of his torture. Long enough for the indignity of being forced to foul his clothes to add to the humilations they heaped on him. And far too long a time to think about Jenna during the intervals when he could think at all. This was one of those intervals- a break where his interrogator hammered at him with words instead of brute force. "The ship is gone. Destroyed by the Andromedans," he replied, without any hope of being believed. 

"Do you take me for a fool?" the interrogator shrieked and lunged forward to grab Blake's hair with such force that it brought involuntary tears to his eyes. "It has been seen! It is still out there, still harassing our forces, still... What are you grinning at?"

"Avon. It's Avon. I knew I could trust him." Blake smiled, despite the pain. "I can rely on my people. And that's why we'll defeat you, no matter what you do to me."

The interrogator laughed. "You think so? All your friends are so loyal, aren't they?" He leaned forward to whisper into Blake's ear. "Who do you think turned you in? Your loyal friend, your loving woman. Jenna Stannis."

Blake wouldn't give the man the satisfaction of knowing how hard that hit. It had been Jenna's handwriting on that note, Jenna's paper and her seal. They must have caught her first, and forced her to betray him. 

The grip tightened on his hair, as the man guessed what Blake was thinking. "Oh, now you're feeling sorry for her. Thinking the poor little lady must have broken under terrible torture. Hah. She came to us. Do you hear me? She came to us! She marched right up and told us she could give us Roj Blake on a platter. Well, no, that's not exactly true. Your Jenna is nobody's fool. She offered to sell you, for a late model pursuit ship. We accepted."

"No," Blake said. "Jenna wouldn't- she couldn't even if she wanted to. There's a price on her head, too."

"There was." The man shrugged. "It's been reported that Liberator has a new pilot. Once Jenna left the ship, she wasn't worth paying a bounty on. After all, she is only a pilot. And when she pointed out that she might still get Liberator for us- well, a pursuit ship seemed a small price to pay."

"No, Jenna, no." Blake closed his eyes. It fit too well, he had to believe it. This hurt worse than anything they'd done to his body. 

"She seemed to feel you had it coming to you. Don't feel bad, Blake. I've had it happen to me. A beautiful woman, she just naturally feels her man owes her things, and if you can't provide them, she'll turn to someone who can."

The interrogator released Blake's hair, but tears continued to leak out from under the closed lids. The man patted Blake on the shoulder. "When it comes right down to it, we're all out for ourselves. Why should you suffer for Avon? He's got your ship, and what have you got? Your life, that's all, Blake. Why should you have to die? You're not much of a threat on your own. We can afford to let you live.You certainly haven't done much on Jevron."

"What do you want?" Blake asked, flatly, without defiance.

"I want the Liberator. Intact. And her crew alive. I can't guarantee they'll stay that way, but if they cooperate..."

A knock on the interrogation room door interrupted the man. "Damn. Just when we were starting to get somewhere." He went to the door, and took a sealed message disk from one of a pair of guards. He broke the seal, read it, and grew visibly annoyed. He returned to Blake and began unfastening the straps that held him upright in the chair. "You're being transferred," he said. "The guards will get you to the medic, clean you up, get you something to eat and drink."

Blake wondered at this unexpected kindness. The guard made a protesting noise, but the interrogator overruled him. "Look, if they think he's so easy to break, they can start from scratch, the way I did." He looked down on Blake, who was just beginning to move his cramped limbs, wincing at the fresh pain. "Give in, Blake. It's easier all around. Look out for yourself. Everyone else does."

Blake shook his head, but he couldn't shake the image of Jenna, sitting at her ease in a Federation office somewhere, casually penning the note that brought him into this hell. He wished she'd shot him, and turned his corpse in for the reward. That would have been more than enough to buy her a ship. Only maybe it wouldn't be enough revenge for her. She'd loved him, given everything up for him, and he turned her down. He shouldn't be surprised that she hated him. He could even have forgiven her for betraying him, but not for setting up the others, not Cally and Avon and Vila. How could she do that to them? How could he have been so mistaken in his judgment? He had trusted her.

***

The medic was brisk and bored. He restricted his remarks to the essential- 'strip', 'shower', 'sit', 'turn your head this way', 'hold still', and finally, 'done'- this last said to the guards who had accompanied Blake to the infirmary. He turned his back and was washing his hands when the guards tossed a plain, clean jumpsuit at Blake. 

Blake dropped it, and leaned heavily against the examination table while he groped awkwardly for it. With a gauze patch over one eye, it was understandable that he would be clumsy. 

It was so understandable that neither of the guards noticed when his fumbling hands covered a scalpel on the examination table. It was a small blade, not half the length of the one that had slashed across his face when an earlier interrogator had a fit of temper. Long enough, though. Cally had taught him how to kill with less. He would turn it on himself rather than chance breaking and giving them the Liberator. But that was a last resort. He needed to escape and stop Jenna before she could betray the rest of his friends. Stop her any way he could. He slipped the scalpel into the sleeve of the jumpsuit, flat against his wrist. There would be a chance somewhere along the line either to escape or to strike back. This wasn't Space Command Headquarters, after all, just a sub- station on a unimportant world far from the heart of the empire.

He kept his head down and shuffled as the guards escorted him to a clean cell and tossed a food concentrates packet onto the 'bunk' before they locked the door and left. It was your basic one- man holding cell, a type all too familiar to Blake. Security camera set above any possible reach, toilet and stopper-less sink. He went to the sink, and stuck his head under the constant rusty trickle, drinking like a desert animal arriving at an oasis. After several minutes, he returned to the bunk, and tore open the packet of concentrates. Then he paused. It wouldn't be very wise to fill his stomach with suppressants. The water couldn't be helped, and he doubted they were sophisticated enough to dose the plumbing to the cells, anyway. But prepackaged Federation prisoner rations? They probably were drugged as part of standard procedure. 

He started to set the packet down when it occurred to him that they were watching and would either force him to eat or simply inject him with drugs if he didn't take the easy way out. He shrugged and broke off a chunk of the food, placing it in his mouth. At least he hoped it looked like that from the camera's angle. Actually, he used the sleight of hand Vila had taught him to slip the food up his sleeve- not the one with the knife. He continued the pantomime until he'd disposed of the major portion of the packet, then he went to the sink for another long drink, and managed to wash the stuff down the drain. 

Then he returned to the bunk, and sat, hands limp in his lap, head hanging, the picture of resignation. His heart was filled with rage; he wanted to scream and protest the cruelty of fate and of the Federation. He also wanted to weep for Jenna and lost opportunities for love. He would have, but Avon had taught him patience, shown him by example how to hide emotions. How not to give the Federation the satisfaction of seeing him suffer.

Blake thought about all the things he'd learned from the crew of the Liberator. And all he'd tried to teach them - loyalty, and dedication, and responsibility for one's fellow man. It seemed Avon had learned. A faint smile tugged at Blake's mouth. His cold, cynical devil's advocate was actively fighting for Blake's cause of his own free will. Hard to believe, and yet, somehow, very easy to believe. Blake missed them all. They were the closest thing to family he had left and it tore at his gut that he could not return to them. Even before Star One he knew they would have to part. He had led them as far as he could. Either they sought him out to willingly join him, or they went their own ways forever. 

He clung to one thought. Avon was still fighting. Sooner or later, he would realize how much better they fought together and he would come to join Blake. There was a link between them, a connection that he felt even now. There must be, or why would he be thinking about Avon while he sat in a cell, aching all over, betrayed by the woman who loved him? 

He had no idea how long he sat, feeling his sense of betrayal grow. When the door opened, he was still musing and didn't even notice. Not until a guard nudged him in the side, digging a gun into Blake. "Move."

"What?" Blake's startlement made his dazed response natural.

"Get up." The guards dragged Blake to his feet and tossed him through the open cell door into the corridor. He staggered to the wall, and waited for them to grab him again and hustle him along the way.

The guards gripped him with bruising force at first, but as he plodded along dully, their hands slackened. The sense of unreality that had begun when his depth perception went was strengthened as he let his head hang down, his overlong hair obscuring a fair portion of his one-eyed vision. About all he could see was a scuffed floor and the booted legs of other Federation guards. Too many. He flexed his arm against the reassuring hardness of the scalpel. Patience. There will be an opportunity. It will happen. It must. He felt his scalp tighten and the muscles on his back gather in near spasmodic ripples, an atavistic response as the predator in him bristled its fur and waited its chance to slip the civilized leash he'd always kept it on. Blake's wolf was eager. Beaten and starved and betrayed, it wanted to kill. It needed to kill. It was all he could do to stop himself from screaming and slashing out right now. 

The light changed subtly. They must be nearing the outside. Jevron's sunlight was less intense than Earth's, a paler, bluer hue that tinged people's skins with the suggestion of corpse flesh. After a while you stopped noticing, but in the Federation-owned building the artificial light had been designed to duplicate that of Earth, bringing the difference to his attention again. The tightness between his shoulders was painful now, as he sensed his captors' attention wavering. The moment was coming. Soon. Soon. A few seconds more.

There was a sudden increase in the blue light, accompanied by laughter, as two people came into the building. Blake's head came up. And in one still, steel-bright moment he would remember for the rest of his life, he saw Jenna, head thrown back and laughing. Laughing gaily as she walked on the arm of a handsome Federation officer, two grinning, bluish corpses, mocking him and his misery.

Predator time-sense is different. Difficult to describe. Everything happens at once, and yet every separate action is noted, and draws a response which the primitive beast judges appropriate. It does not consider the future, or the past, or anything outside the immediate necessities of survival. Blake's beast had been chained too long. Not even a saint could have held it back.

And yet.

Blake tried.

He pulled the scalpel free and stabbed the nearest guard, using his hand to guide and support the slender blade as it tore in through the soft underbelly, beneath the ribcage and into the heart. He left the scalpel in place, as he yanked his hand back. It kept the blood flow down as he ripped the gun from the dead man, who had not even known he was attacked until it was over. He pivoted on one foot and shot the other guard, who was turning - it seemed to Blake - in slow-motion.

Blake's gun continued its smooth arc, blasting the officer beside Jenna. The man had not time to wipe the smile off his face before the charge hit. 

Jenna stared at Blake as her escort landed at her feet. The after-effect of two blasts in close-quarters made Blake's ears ring. "Why, Jenna? Why?" he asked, begging with his whole heart and soul for her to give him some reason to let her live. Any reason.

"The ship, Blake..." 

"The ship," Blake said softly. As the interrogator had said. Jenna's eyes widened and she drew the small gun at her side. 

"Blake!" she shouted, and shot. 

"Jenna!" he cried, and shot.

Jenna fell. And so did the Federation guard who had been coming up behind Blake. Blake turned his head, and saw the body of the man who would have killed him if not for Jenna, and knew he'd been wrong. 

He dropped the gun and went to Jenna, kneeling on the floor beside her. She was lying on her side, eyes still wide and startled, gasping. Perhaps because of his lack of depth perception he had not killed her outright. "I'll get you to a doctor, Jenna. Hold on." He tried to pick her up, but she cried out in such agony that he gave it up and settled her as comfortably as possible on the floor. "They have a medic here. I'll go get him."

"No." Jenna's voice was weak, but clear. "The ship." She tugged at a small pouch attached to her belt. "Dock number, codes, clearance, launch, all. Take the ship." She pressed Blake's hand to the pouch, only relaxing when he took it. She smiled at him. "Flight programmed. Take you to Avalon."

"You planned this?" Blake asked. He wanted to shake her for what she had done to the two of them. "My God, Jenna. Why? Did you want your freedom so badly?"

She shook her head faintly. "No. Wanted yours. Leave Jevron. Be Roj Blake." She drew a long, rattling breath. "Wish you had loved me." 

Blake had to lean forward, his ear almost against her lips to hear the last few words and the very final sigh that followed. "I did, Jenna," he said softly. " I wish I had told you." 

He stroked her hair, then picked up the pouch and rose, looking down at Jenna. She had closed her eyes as he held her, and smiled. And died like that. She looked as if she were asleep, waiting for her prince to awaken her with a kiss. "Only he waited too long. I'm sorry, Jenna." Coming back to himself, he realized he was still standing in the Federation stronghold on Jevron. There had been no alarms, no sounds of running feet or shouts of dismay, but those would follow. He had to get to the spaceport, to the ship Jenna had gotten for him. If he let himself be captured, her sacrifice would be in vain. But first- he couldn't go out in public like this, jumpsuit spattered with the blood of the guard he'd knifed. The smell of the blood nauseated him. He felt as though it was Jenna's blood on his hands. He wiped his hands and arms relatively clean, then took the tunic from her escort, pulling it on over his own clothes.

***

It was only afterward, when he had somehow gotten to the spaceport and taken off, without pursuit, that he realized Jenna must have arranged the lack of alarms too. Maybe Vila had taught her a few things along the way. 

Blake stared out into space. The eternal black void usually made him think of the countless billions who suffered under the Federation. Now he could only see one face, smiling. Happy that he was back among the stars.

Jenna had loved him, and not betrayed him. He had been - as Cally said, so long ago - only mistaken.


	2. Addenda

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes people lie to you for your own good.

Jenna opened her eyes. Good. Blake had gone. She got up as quickly as she could, holding one hand against her side. From the feel of it, several ribs had gone, either from the force of Blake's shot or from smashing into the floor. She slid a fingernail under the edge of her under-tunic, loosening it. She was sure it had left the pattern of its micro-circuitry embossed on her skin. The man who'd sold it to her had sworn it was impervious to projectiles and beam weapons alike. He hadn't mentioned how sore it made you afterward. She was glad that Blake hadn't aimed for the head, or she'd be too dead to feel anything.

She stooped again to pick up her own weapon and to make sure that none of the Federation guards were alive. She grimaced at the corpse Blake had knifed. She hadn't thought him capable of it-- not that sort of killing. It wasn't like the clean, impersonal death of a space battle. You didn't smell the dead in vacuum, or see their glazing, uncomprehending eyes, or have to step over a puddle of gore to keep from leaving tracks.

She glanced around once more, making certain she wasn't leaving any evidence behind. Then she slipped out into the false twilight of Jevron's day. Of course, the Federation didn't need evidence against her. She'd be the first one they'd look for in the wake of Blake's escape. But she hadn't been a free-trader all her adult life for nothing. There were always places to hide, and ways to escape. Particularly if you weren't choosy.

She hadn't been choosy in a long, long time. Not since the Federation murdered her mother. She still didn't know why they'd done it. Or why they'd given her to an Alpha couple to raise as their own instead of killing her too. She shook her head. That was over-- over so long ago that it may as well have happened to a different Jenna. Pointless to think about it now.

The alarm finally sounded behind her, but as she had reached a crowded public way, it didn't seem wise to jump up and start running. Instead she looked toward the sound, as others did, and walked quickly in the opposite direction, as all the sensible people did.

Breddan wouldn't shelter her. Not with the amount of pressure the Federation would bring to bear on this miserable outpost planet. He'd turn her in so fast it would make her head spin, especially if they offered a few credits. There was a rumor that Breddan had sold his grandmother, along with her pet pussycats, to an experimental lab when he was a youngster. Jenna believed it.

***

Her hideaway wasn't a grimy, rat-infested tenement. She might have been able to disguise her Outworld origins, but impersonating one of the second-class, meek and mild, women of Jevron was out out of the question. Not that her way was any more pleasant, but it was more practical.

She had hoped to rescue Blake and get off Jevron with him, but she'd made provisions against the chance they'd be separated. After what she'd done to him, she wasn't sure he'd even want to stay with her. Playing dead seemed easier than explaining, and the shock had gotten through to him, made him react for once as a man, without totting up all the advantages and disadvantages to the rebellion. She frowned, remembering the bandage over his eye. She'd tried to impress the local troops with Blake's value, alive and undamaged. But it had taken longer than she anticipated to get the ship ready, and Blake's stubbornness must have annoyed someone. At least he was alive, and the last she'd heard, free. The ship was a good one, and the route she'd fed into its computers should have brought him safely to Avalon.

She sighed. Maybe someday she could find him and explain. That is, if he didn't really kill her for her betrayal before she could talk. He wouldn't understand how it had hurt her to see him begging scraps of attention from the Jevron underground. He had been a leader, a fighter, a man who never surrendered. She couldn't let him fade away, becoming a shadow of himself. Better that he should mourn her and seek revenge. Or find the truth and hate her. Either way he would feel something. And live until he died.

As she would.

She raked long, sharp, silvery-taloned fingernails through her tiger-striped mane of hair that matched the tawny gold of her naked shoulders. Neither skin nor hair dye was permanent, but what she'd done to Blake had left indelible marks on her soul. She smoothed the black leather corset in place, inspecting herself in the mirror one last time before beginning her shift. She was the leader, the one everyone watched, so her appearance was important. Her green-slitted contact lenses glittered behind her black velvet half-mask, adding to the feline illusion. She grinned and ran a finger over the extended points of her false canine teeth. What a silly outfit. It made her laugh to see it here, but on the job she was deadly serious, demanding the full attention of those who paid for her services. Since some of them were Federation officers, she made sure they only saw the Tiger Woman.

And felt her claws.

One thing, there were so few Jevron women suited to this job that it paid handsomely. One day soon she could afford passage off this world. In the meantime, she had a living to make.

She picked up the cat-o-nine-tails, pushed aside the gilt-edged curtain separating her from the customers, and got back to work.


End file.
